Herman Cain is Pro-Choice!

The other day, I sorted throughHerman Cain's recent muddled comments on abortion and concluded that he was just unaware that this is an issue that involves laws, both current and potential, that affect what people can and can't do. Every time he got asked about abortion, he would answer as if he were advising a young woman not to get one. So he explained that he believes life begins at conception, and no one should get an abortion, even in cases of rape and incest. But he was far less clear on what he thinks the law ought to be.

But now we may be getting some progress. Via Dan Amira, here's Cain explaining his pro-choice -- yes, pro-choice -- views on abortion:

CAIN: No, it comes down to it's not the government's role or anybody else's role to make that decision. Secondly, if you look at the statistical incidents, you're not talking about that big a number. So what I'm saying is it ultimately gets down to a choice that that family or that mother has to make.

Not me as president, not some politician, not a bureaucrat. It gets down to that family. And whatever they decide, they decide. I shouldn't have to tell them what decision to make for such a sensitive issue.

MORGAN: By expressing the view that you expressed, you are effectively — you might be president. You can't hide behind now the mask, if you don't mind me saying, of being the pizza guy. You might be the president of United States of America. So your views on these things become exponentially massively more important. They become a directive to the nation.

CAIN: No they don't. I can have an opinion on an issue without it being a directive on the nation. The government shouldn't be trying to tell people everything to do, especially when it comes to social decisions that they need to make.

This position -- I'm personally opposed, but it's not the government's right to dictate -- has been the position of many a Democratic politician for decades. But a Republican running for president? Holy cow.

I'll wager that at some point in the next 48 hours, Herman Cain will issue a statement affirming that he didn't actually mean what everyone thought he meant, and in fact he wants Roe v. Wade overturned and abortion made illegal in most or all circumstances, just like every other Republican candidate. Just you wait.

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About the Author

Paul Waldman is a weekly columnist and senior writer for The American Prospect. He also writes for the Plum Line blog at The Washington Post and The Week and is the author of Being Right is Not Enough: What Progressives Must Learn From Conservative Success.